Monday, September 05, 2022

You wonder whether the wax figures are thinking of you. Resenting you for your mobility, your ability to dart in and out of their personal space, taking endless selfies and family portraits with them as props, objects of reverence or lust or derision. You walk away into the next room of the exhibition and they stand prone as though frozen in time. Maybe there’s something they know that you don’t know. You sense it from their sly smiles and unblinking gaze.

After the pop stars and the Royal fam you get a bit of history: in the Reign of Terror Madame Tussaud was enlisted to make death masks of aristocrats by clutching their freshly severed heads between her knees. I guess someone had to do it. Exit through Star Wars and the gift shop.


Sunday, September 04, 2022

I couldn’t really comprehend it all so I decided to focus on random details: the wording of a billboard, the arrangement of furniture in a living room spied from the top of a bus. It seemed to help.

Thursday, September 01, 2022

At the bus stop at night I was suddenly gripped by the impulse to take a picture of the street sparkling from the rain. It was a humdrum scene—parked cars, kebab shops, delivery guys on bikes. Traffic lights on red. When I first tapped the button it didn’t take. Almost like it wasn’t meant to be. The light turned green, I tried again. It worked.